Chapter 9. The Great Strike

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_ CHAPTER IX. THE GREAT STRIKE

It was Saturday afternoon, a time at which Stokebridge was generally lively. The men, (dinner over, and the great weekly wash done,) usually crowded the public-houses, or played bowls and quoits on a piece of waste land known as "the common," or set off upon a spree to Birmingham or Wolverhampton, or sat on low walls or other handy seats, and smoked and talked. But upon this special Saturday afternoon no one settled down to his ordinary pursuits, for the men stood talking in groups in the street, until, as the hour of four approached, there was a general move towards the common. Hither, too, came numbers of men from the colliery villages round, until some four or five thousand were gathered in front of an old "waste tip" at one corner of the common. Presently a group of some five or six men came up together, made their way through the throng, and took their stand on the edge of the tip, some twenty feet above the crowd. These were the delegates, the men sent by the union to persuade the colliers of Stokebridge and its neighbourhood to join in a general strike for a rise of wages.

The women of the village stand at their doors, and watch the men go off to the meeting, and then comment to each other concerning it.

"I ain't no patience wi' 'em, Mrs. Haden," said one of a group of neighbours who had gathered in front of her house; "I don't hold by strikes. I have gone through three of 'em, bad un's, besides a score of small un's, and I never knowed good come on 'em. I lost my little Peg in the last--low fever, the doctor called it, but it was starvation and nothing more."

"If I had my way," said Mrs. Haden, "I'd just wring the heads off they delegates. They come here and 'suades our men to go out and clem rather than take a shilling a week less, just a glass o' beer a day, and they gets their pay and lives in comfort, and dunna care nowt if us and th' childer all dies off together."

"Talk o' woman's rights, as one hears about, and woman's having a vote; we ought to have a vote as to strikes. It's us as bears the worse o't, and we ought to have a say on't; if we did there wouldn't be another strike in the country."

"It's a burning shame," another chimed in; "here us and the childer will have to starve for weeks, months may be, and all the homes will be broke up, and the furniture, which has took so long to get together, put away, just because the men won't do with one glass of beer less a day."

"The union's the curse of us a'," Mrs. Haden said. "I know what it'll be--fifteen bob a week for the first fortnight, and then twelve for a week, and then ten, and then eight, and then six, and then after we've clemmed on that for a month or two, the union'll say as the funds is dry, and the men had best go to work on the reduction. I knows their ways, and they're a cuss to us women."

"Here be'st thy Jack. He grows a proper lad that."

"Ay," Jane Haden agreed, "he's a good lad, none better; and as for learning, the books that boy knows is awesome; there's shelves upon shelves on 'em upstairs, and I do believe he's read 'em all a dozen times. Well, Jack, have ee cum from meeting?"

"Ay, mother; I heard them talk nonsense till I was nigh sick, and then I comed away."

"And will they go for the strike, Jack?"

"Ay, they'll go, like sheep through a gate. There's half a dozen or so would go t'other way, but the rest won't listen to them. So for the sake of a shilling a week we're going to lose thirty shillings a week for perhaps twenty weeks; so if we win we sha'n't get the money we've throw'd away for twenty times thirty weeks, mother, and that makes eleven years and twenty-eight weeks."

Jack Simpson was now sixteen years old, not very tall for his age, but square and set. His face was a pleasant one, in spite of his closely cropped hair. He had a bright fearless eye and a pleasant smile; but the square chin, and the firm determined lines of the mouth when in rest, showed that his old appellation of Bull-dog still suited him well. After working for four years as a gate-boy and two years with the waggons, he had just gone in to work with his adopted father in the stall, filling the coal in the waggon as it was got down, helping to drive the wedges, and at times to use the pick. As the getters--as the colliers working at bringing down the coal are called--are paid by the ton, many of the men have a strong lad working with them as assistant.

"Is t' dad like to be at home soon, Jack?" Mrs. Haden asked, as she followed him into the house.

"Not he, mother. They pretty well all will be getting themselves in order for earning nothing by getting drunk to-night, and dad's not slack at that. Have you got tea ready, mother?"

"Ay, lad."

"I've made up my mind, mother," the boy said, as he ate his slice of bacon and bread, "that I shall go over to Birmingham to-morrow, and try to get work there. John Ratcliffe, the engineman, is going to write a letter for me to some mates of his there. The last two years, when I've been on the night-shift, I have gone in and helped him a bit pretty often in the day, so as to get to know something about an engine, and to be able to do a job of smith's work; anyhow, he thinks I can get a berth as a striker or something of that sort. I'd rather go at once, for there will be plenty of hands looking out for a job before long, when the pinch begins, and I don't want to be idle here at home."

"They've promised to give some sort o' allowance to non-unionists, Jack."

"Yes, mother, but I'd rather earn it honestly. I'm too young to join the union yet, but I have made up my mind long ago never to do it. I mean to be my own master, and I ain't going to be told by a pack of fellows at Stafford or Birmingham whether I am to work or not, and how much I am to do, and how many tubs I am to fill. No, mother, I wasn't born a slave that I know of, and certainly don't mean to become one voluntarily."

"Lor, how thou dost talk, Jack! Who'd take 'ee to be a pitman?"

"I don't want to be taken for anything that I am not, mother. What with reading and with going two hours twice a week of an evening for six years, to talk and work with Mr. Merton, I hope I can express myself properly when I choose. As you know, when I'm away from you I talk as others do, for I hate any one to make remarks. If the time ever comes when I am to take a step up, it will be time enough for them to talk; at present, all that the other lads think of me is, that I am fond of reading, and that I can lick any fellow of my own age in the mine," and he laughed lightly. "And now, mother, I shall go in and tell Mr. Merton what I have made up my mind to do."

Mr. Merton listened to Jack's report of his plans in silence, and then after a long pause said:

"I have been for some time intending to talk seriously to you, Jack, about your future, and the present is a good time for broaching the subject. You see, my boy, you have worked very hard, and have thrown your whole strength into it for six years. You have given no time to the classics or modern languages, but have put your whole heart into mathematics; you have a natural talent for it, and you have had the advantage of a good teacher. I may say so," he said, "for I was third wrangler at Cambridge."

"You, sir!" Jack exclaimed in astonishment.

"Yes, lad, you may well be surprised at seeing a third wrangler a village schoolmaster, but you might find, if you searched, many men who took as high a degree, in even more humble positions. I took a fellowship, and lived for many years quietly upon it; then I married, and forfeited my fellowship. I thought, like many other men, that because I had taken a good degree I could earn my living. There is no greater mistake. I had absolutely no knowledge that was useful that way. I tried to write; I tried to get pupils: I failed all round. Thirteen years ago, after two years of marriage, my wife died; and in despair of otherwise earning my bread, and sick of the struggle I had gone through, I applied for this little mastership, obtained it, and came down with Alice, then a baby of a year old. I chafed at first, but I am contented now, and no one knows that Mr. Merton is an ex-fellow of St. John's. I had still a little property remaining, just enough to have kept Alice always at a good school. I do not think I shall stay here much longer. I shall try to get a larger school, in some town where I may find a few young men to teach of an evening. I am content for myself; but Alice is growing up, and I should wish, for her sake, to get a step up in the world again. I need not say, my lad, that I don't want this mentioned. Alice and you alone know my story. So you see," he went on more lightly, "I may say you have had a good teacher. Now, Jack, you are very high up in mathematics. Far higher than I was at your age; and I have not the slightest doubt that you will in a couple of years be able to take the best open scholarship of the year at Cambridge, if you try for it. That would keep you at college, and you might hope confidently to come out at least as high as I did, and to secure a fellowship, which means three or four hundred a year, till you marry. But to go through the university you must have a certain amount of Latin and Greek. You have a good two years, before you have to go up, and if you devote yourself as steadily to classics as you have to mathematics, you could get up enough to scrape through with. Don't give me any answer now, Jack. The idea is, of course, new to you. Think it very quietly over, and we can talk about it next time you come over from Birmingham."

"Yes, sir, thank you very much," Jack said, quietly; "only, please tell me, do you yourself recommend it?"

The schoolmaster was silent for a while.

"I do not recommend one way or the other, Jack. I would rather leave it entirely to you. You would be certain to do well in one way there. You are, I believe, equally certain to do well here, but your advance may be very much slower. And now, Jack, let us lay it aside for to-night. I am just going to have tea, I hope you will take a cup with us."

Jack coloured with pleasure. It was the first time that such an invitation had been given to him, and he felt it as the first recognition yet made that he was something more than an ordinary pit-boy; but for all that he felt, when he followed his master into the next room, that he would have rather been anywhere else.

It was a tiny room, but daintily furnished--a room such as Jack had never seen before; and by the fire sat a girl reading. She put down her book as her father entered with a bright smile; but her eyes opened a little wider in surprise as Jack followed him in.

"My dear Alice, this is my pupil, Jack Simpson, who is going to do me great credit, and make a figure in the world some day. Jack, this is my daughter, Miss Merton."

Alice held out her hand.

"I have heard papa speak of you so often," she said, "and of course I have seen you come in and out sometimes when I have been home for the holidays."

"I have seen you in church," Jack said, making a tremendous effort to shake off his awkwardness.

Jack Simpson will to the end of his life look back upon that hour as the most uncomfortable he ever spent. Then for the first time he discovered that his boots were very heavy and thick; then for the first time did his hands and feet seem to get in his way, and to require thought as to what was to be done with them; and at the time he concluded that white lace curtains, and a pretty carpet, and tea poured out by a chatty and decidedly pretty young lady, were by no means such comfortable institutions as might have been expected.

It was two months from the commencement of the strike before Jack Simpson returned from Birmingham, coming home to stay from Saturday till Monday. Nothing can be more discouraging than the appearance of a colliery village where the hands are on strike. For the first week or two there is much bravado, and anticipation of early victory; and as money is still plentiful, the public-houses do a great trade. But as the stern reality of the struggle becomes felt, a gloom falls over the place. The men hang about listlessly, and from time to time straggle down to the committee-room, to hear the last news from the other places to which the strike extends, and to try to gather a little confidence therefrom. At first things always look well. Meetings are held in other centres, and promises of support flow in. For a time money arrives freely, and the union committee make an allowance to each member, which, far below his regular pay as it is, is still amply sufficient for his absolute wants. But by the end of two months the enthusiasm which the strike excited elsewhere dies out, the levies fall off, and the weekly money scarce enables life to be kept together.

It is distinctive of almost all strikes, that the women, beforehand averse to the movement, when it has once begun, throw themselves heartily into the struggle. From the time it is fairly entered upon until its termination it is rare indeed to hear a collier's wife speak a word against it. When the hardest pinch comes, and the children's faces grow thin and white, and the rooms are stripped of furniture, much as the women may long for an end of it, they never grumble, never pray their husbands to give in. This patient submission to their husbands' wills--this silent bearing of the greatest of suffering, namely, to see children suffer and to be unable to relieve them--is one of the most marked features of all great strikes in the coal districts.

"Well, mother, and how goes it?" Jack asked cheerfully after the first greetings.

"We be all right, Jack; if we ain't we ought to be, when we've got no children to keep, and get nigh as much as them as has."

"Eight shillings a week now, ain't it?"

Mrs. Haden nodded. Jack looked round.

"Holloa!" he said, "the clock's gone, and the new carpet!"

"Well, you see, my boy," Mrs. Haden said, hesitatingly, "Bill is down-hearted sometimes, and he wants a drop of comfort."

"I understand," Jack said significantly.

"Jack,"--and she again spoke hesitatingly--"I wish ee'd carry off all they books out o' thy little room. There's scores of 'em, and the smallest would fetch a glass o' beer. I've kept the door locked, but it might tempt him, my boy--not when he's in his right senses, you know, he'd scorn to do such a thing; but when he gets half on, and has no more money, and credit stopped, the craving's too much for him, and he'd sell the bed from under him--anything he's got, I do believe, except his pups;" and she pointed to some of Juno's great grandchildren, which were, as usual, lying before the fire, a mere handful of coal now, in comparison with past times.

"I'll pick out a parcel of them that will be useful to me," Jack said, "and take them away. The rest may go. And now look here, mother. After paying you for my board, I have had for a long time now some eight shillings a week over. I have spent some in books, but second-hand books are very cheap--as dad will find when he tries to sell them. So I've got some money put by. It don't matter how much, but plenty to keep the wolf away while the strike lasts. But I don't mean, mother, to have my savings drunk away. I'm getting sixteen bob a week, and I can live on ten or eleven, so I'll send you five shillings a week. But dad mustn't know it. I'll be home in a month again, and I'll leave you a pound, so that you can get food in. If he thinks about it at all, which ain't likely, you can make out you get it on tick. Well, dad, how are you?" he asked, as Bill Haden entered the cottage.

"Ah, Jack, lad, how be it with 'ee?"

"All right, dad; getting on well. And how are things here?"

"Bad, Jack. Those scoundrels, the masters, they won't give in; but we're bound to beat 'em--bound to. If they don't come to our terms we mean to call the engine-men, and the hands they've got to keep the ways clear, out of the pits. That'll bring 'em to their senses quick enough. I've been for it all along."

"Call off the engine-hands!" Jack said, in tones of alarm; "you ain't going to do such a mad thing as that! Why, if the water gains, and the mines get flooded, it'll be weeks, and maybe months, before the mines can be cleared and put in working order; and what will you all be doing while that's being done?"

"It'll bring 'em to their senses, lad," Bill Haden said, bringing his hand down on the table with a thump. "They mean to starve us; we'll ruin them. There, let's have the price of a quart, Jack; I'm dry."

Jack saw that argument against this mad scheme would be of no use, for his foster-father was already half-drunk, so he handed him a shilling, and with a shrug of his shoulders walked off to Mr. Merton's.

He had long since written to his master, saying that he preferred working his way up slowly in mining, to entering upon a new life, in which, however successful he might be at college, the after course was not clear to him; and his teacher had answered in a tone of approval of his choice.

On his way he stopped at the houses of many of his boy friends, and was shocked at the misery which already prevailed in some of them. Harry Shepherd's home was no better than the others.

"Why, Harry, I should scarce have known you," he said, as the lad came to the door when he opened it and called him. "You look bad, surely."

"We're a big family, Jack; and the extra children's allowance was dropped last week. There's eight of us, and food's scarce. Little Annie's going fast, I think. The doctor came this morning, and said she wanted strengthening food. He might as well ha' ordered her a coach-and-four. Baby died last week, and mother's ailing. You were right, Jack; what fools we were to strike! I've been miles round looking for a job, but it's no use; there's fifty asking for every place open."

The tears came into Jack's eyes as he looked at the pinched face of his friend.

"Why did you not write to me?" he asked, almost angrily. "I told you where a letter would find me; and here are you all clemming, and me know nought of it. It's too bad. Now look here, Harry, I must lend you some money--you know I've got some put by, and you and your father can pay me when good times come again. Your dad gets his eight shillings from the union, I suppose?"

"Yes," the lad answered.

"Well, with fifteen shillings a week you could make a shift to get on. So I'll send you ten shillings a week for a bit; that'll be seven shillings to add to the eight, and the other three will get meat to make broth for Annie. The strike can't last much over another month, and that won't hurt me one way or the other. Here's the first ten shillings; put it in your pocket, and then come round with me to the butcher and I'll get a few pounds of meat just to start you all. There, don't cry, and don't say anything, else I'll lick you."

But when Jack himself entered the schoolmaster's house, and was alone with Mr. Merton, he threw himself in a chair and burst into tears.

"It is awful, sir, awful. To see those little children, who were so noisy and bright when I went away, so pale, and thin, and quiet now. Poor little things! poor little things! As to the men, they are starving because they don't choose to work, and if they like it, let them; even the women I don't pity so much, for if they did right they would take broomsticks and drive the men to work; but the children, it's dreadful!"

"It is dreadful, Jack, and it makes me feel sick and ill when I go into the infant-school. The clergyman's wife has opened a sort of soup-kitchen, and a hundred children get a bowl of soup and a piece of bread at dinner-time every day, and they sell soup under cost price to the women. Mr. Brook has given fifty pounds towards it."

"Look here, sir," Jack said; "you know I've over fifty pounds laid by--and money can't be better spent than for the children. The strike can't last over a month, or six weeks at the outside, and maybe not that. I'll give you three pounds a week, if you will kindly hand it over to Mrs. Street, and say it's been sent you. But it's to go to feeding children. Let me see; the soup don't cost above a penny a bowl, and say a halfpenny for a hunch of bread. So that will give a good many of 'em a dinner every day. Will you do that for me, sir?"

"I will, my boy," Mr. Merton said heartily. "You may save many a young life."

"Well, sir, and what do you think of things?"

"I fear we shall have trouble, Jack. Last night there was rioting over at Crawfurd; a manager's house was burnt down, and some policemen badly hurt. There is angry talk all over the district, and I fear we shall have it here."

When Jack started on Sunday evening for Birmingham, his last words to his mother were:

"Mind, mother, the very first word you hear about violence or assault, you post this envelope I have directed, to me. I will come straight back. I'll keep father out of it somehow; and I'll do all I can to save Mr. Brook's property. He's a good master, and he's been specially kind to me, and I won't have him or his property injured."

"Why, lauk a' mercy, Jack, you ain't going to fight the whole place all by yourself, are you?"

"I don't know what I am going to do yet," Jack said; "but you may be quite sure I shall do something."

And as his mother looked at the set bull-dog expression of his mouth and jaw, she felt that Jack was thoroughly in earnest. _

Read next: Chapter 10. Hard Times

Read previous: Chapter 8. Progress

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